As We Celebrate The Charter Let's Mourn Over One Of Its Children: The Singh Decision.

Five Feet of Fury is hosting a couple of SunTV news clips about the Charter that should be watched. Ezra Levant is really on the money with his commentary (he briefly mentions the Singh decision at the eight minute mark).

Perhaps conceived with the best of intentions the Charter has, in effect, been a big windfall for the parasitic legal profession. Since it now allows the bestowing of cash rewards to those who suffer the slightest offence to one's hurt feelings what the Charter has ultimately accomplished was to add a whole new layer to personal injury law turning constitutional lawyers into a new breed of ambulance chasers. It is nothing more than a document written by lawyers for lawyers.

Are we freer as a people because of it? That's debatable. What does the Charter provide that the British North America Act didn't to grant us more freedoms?

It did transfer legislative powers away from elected officials to an unaccountable judiciary. In essence Canada is governed by courtroom judges who tend to rule based on what's politically fashionable and whatever ideological biases they happen to fancy that day. It's foolish to assume judges are creatures of objectivity.

It also, it seems, allows for the restricting of the most fundamental right one can have in a democracy: the right to free speech. If it didn't then why have some Canadians been brought before a kangaroo court system over the crime of having an opinion?

I guess this is why those on the "progressive" left love the Charter so much. Forget democracy, all you have to do is keep challenging a law until you get a ruling you like and then, TA-DAH, it becomes the law of the land irrespective of what the majority of Canadians want or what Parliament decrees. It also compels you to agree with them on any issue through the threat of a "hate crime" offence or a human rights complaint. It allows the left to govern all the time as a kind of shadow government imposing their will onto the Canadian populace through the court system no matter what party is in power in Ottawa.

And of course, there's the Singh decision. Because of a flaw in its wording the Charter has effectively erased the Canadian border by allowing anyone to enter Canada and stay indefinitely as a guest with all the inherent rights of a Canadian citizen - except the right to vote (and how many and often do Canadians exercise that right?) - if they say the magic "r word." This weakens Canada as a sovereign nation and poses a threat to the country's citizens and national security by undermining the ability to control the inflow of people. And it came to be this way because a single silly person, a single judge, agreed with the Charter backed arguments of an opportunistic lawyer and his scheming Sikh clients. One person and her opinion and a multi-billion dollar boondoggle near thirty years on.

What irks me is that we to turn to an unaccountable judiciary system in order to get back what should be naturally ours to begin with. Who are these people to tell us what we can and cannot say? The idea that unelected judges can pretty much rewrite legislation thanks to the powers the Charter gives them is unacceptable and undemocratic.

In any case my real beef is with the Sigh decision and it exists because of the Charter. Taken to its logical conclusion the Charter protects every single person in the world. The fact that they have to be on Canadian soil for this to take effect is just a technical detail that, if I'm not mistaken, some want to address. I might be wrong but I do recall there were some advocacy groups who want to extend Charter protection to anyone who merely expresses a desire to come to Canada. The logic being that they are Canadians-in-waiting and the fact that they are not on Canadian territory shouldn't disqualify them from Charter protection. We already grant it to non-citizens anyway so why should geographical location make a difference?

" I might be wrong but I do recall there were some advocacy groups who want to extend Charter protection to anyone who merely expresses a desire to come to Canada. The logic being that they are Canadians-in-waiting"